


Agora's Lives: Zuko of Kaen

by Agora500



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Βίοι Παράλληλοι - Πλούταρχος | Parallel Lives - Plutarch
Genre: F/M, Loosely Historically Based Around the Greek Fifth Century BC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-11-28 12:30:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18208337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agora500/pseuds/Agora500
Summary: It is ATLA but an ancient greek AU.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The story will be written in a normal third person formate from here on out. This is just contextual knowledge that is written like a history.

The four nations existed in a small, rugged peninsular that jutted from the mainland. Dotted with rough mountains and small valleys and across a sea of scattered islands, the benders lived in a series of small autonomous city-states, each with its own government, laws and culture. This is the life of Zuko of Kaen and his rise to fame and distinction in the bending world.

Zuko was the son of Ozai, a military commander and one of the ten Fire Lords which ruled the city of Kaen during the Barbarian War. The Barbarians lived in a vast kingdom in the north and east, consolidated under the first Great King a century before the war. These people were not benders and so for all time had kept their distance from the peoples of the four nations, whom they feared due to their supernatural powers. This status quo gave complacency to the peoples of the four nations, who never took the threat of the barbarians seriously, preferring to war with each other for local dominance. This all changed in the Barbarian War as the Great King's empire had grown so large and so rich that she dwarfed the benders in manpower and resources. They used their vast resources—promises of land, money and positions of prominence in the Great King's court—to recruit prominent benders and even some major bending cities to their cause. Once assured that they held the advantage the Great King sent his army to subjugate the benders. 

These traitorous cities, most prominent of them Gaoling, provided food, water, shelter and benders for the barbarian armies. Allowing them at once, a base in the peninsula and a means to fight the benders in open combat. Zuko's father, Ozai, was one of the heroes that lead the city of Kaen to prominence in the war, winning a number of victories for the city against the barbarians and allowing time for the Di Lee of Ba Sing Se to rally the defence of the four nations against the invaders. The battle of the Serpent's Pass would prove the decisive battle for the benders during the war, as they routed the armies of the barbarians and won a total victory, humiliating the Great King. In choosing this to be the decisive battleground, however, the Di Lee had allowed many of the northern bender cities to fall to the barbarians. Among them was Kaen which was sacked and destroyed in the war, causing no small amount of animosity between her people and the people of Ba Sing Se. Ozai himself died at the battle of the straits, his fleet routing the barbarians but not before his own ship sunk to the bottom of the sea. 

At the end of the war, having come so close to defeat, the benders formed the Great League of Benders under the leadership of the Di Lee. This alliance was meant to unify the four nations against a possible second invasion by the barbarians. However, their leader, Shu Feng took advantage of his position and began installing agents in the cities under his protection as to extort money and precious artefacts from them. The fire nation was especially displeased and began to look to Kaen as a possible alternative to the leadership of Ba Sing Se. Kaen was the largest city in the four nations, the wealthiest and controlled the largest navy in the Small Sea. Taking into account the victories won by the Kaenians during the war, they seemed to be the only city that could challenge the dominance of Ba Sing Se. So it was that two rival leagues formed, the Fire League lead by Kaen and the Earth League lead by Ba Sing Se. 

It was with this background, the name of his father behind him and the guidance of his uncle that Zuko began his political career with an expedition to Imiq, to ensure the loyalty of the city to the Fire League.


	2. The Victory at Imiq

[1] Zuko's fleet reached Imiq on a rainy day in the middle of winter to find that the port of the city had been closed off with a serrated chain, threatening irreversible damage to any ship which dared pass it. The Kaen fleet under Zuko's command was a small one, consisting of only twenty-five ships and housing nine hundred firebenders. Although Imiq was a small city with few ships it was also a water tribe city, allowing her a great advantage in naval combat. Waterbenders stood on the shore and on the dockyards, intent on staring down the son of Ozai and forcing him into retreat. Most would have done so, if begrudgingly, but Zuko was a cunning tactician who would show a brilliance for strategy even in this early stage of his career. He ordered his navy to split apart sending ten of his ships to the northernmost shore of the island, on which Imiq sat, and the rest of the fleet toward a neighbouring island on which the city of Ocenia stood in eyesight of their rebellious cousins. The citizens of Imiq quickly sent their benders to follow the northern fleet and prevent it from landing at some other point on the island, erecting large walls of jagged ice to prevent them from beaching. The smaller fleet continued to circle the island, staying just out of range of the waterbenders while melting their ice walls to ensure they remained busy. 

[2] When Zuko landed in Ocenia, whose people had been loyal to Kaen as their sister city revolted across the channel, he ordered his men to build a series of catapults on the shore from which to bombard Imiq. The people of Ocenia, who were also water tribe, were offended by this and threatened to revolt. Zuko promised them that he would not harm the people of Imiq unduly after its surrender to him and that he would give the coy-fish, Twi and La—who were immortal patrons of the water tribes— to the Ocenians after the attack, knowing that the sacred animals had been stolen from the Ocenians fifty years before. This was enough to placate them and so they allowed Zuko to build his cross channel siege. [3] When the Imiqi spotted this construction they imminently withdrew their chain and set sail into the channel, intent on building a massive wave between their cannons to wash away the siege engines. [4] It was then that Zuko ordered his fleet to dash out of the Ocenia port, faking a panicked retreat. The Imiqi, lead by their leader Hakoda, fell for this trick and believed that they had won the day. Once they had made there way further into the Small Sea he darted his fleet back toward the city of Imiq. [5] Hakoda, who was too busy ordering the destruction of the siege engines, did not notice the move until it was too late. By the time he routed his fleet, Zuko had landed his forces and dismounted his men. He ordered them deep into the heart of the city where they would not be caught by the sea which would undoubtedly heed to the destructive will of any nearby waterbender. [6] Hakoda new imminently that he was beaten and returned to his city having broken his weapons in a sign of peace. Zuko had reclaimed Imiq without losing a single man, this would become a thing to brag about in future and as news reached Kaen it was first heard by disbelieving ears and then with cheers of praises for the young general. 

[7] Zuko's terms for the city were neither too tough nor too lenient. He did not confiscate or burn the city's cannons as he listened to their pleas, explaining that they needed the boats to fish when the winter harvests were poor. [8] He did, however, keep his word and send the holy fish to the city of Ocenia. [9] To ensure the loyalty of the chief Hakoda in future, and that of his son Sokka he declared that his daughter Katara would become a prisoner in Kaen. [10] As long as the city paid its tribute to the Fire League and did not again revolt no harm would come to her. They would reluctantly agree.

**Author's Note:**

> The story will be written in a normal third person formate from here on out. This is just contextual knowledge that is written like a history.


End file.
